Michigan Radio News

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March 31, 2010

Federal and state authorities have arrested nine members of a self-styled militia group who are said to have been plotting to kill policemen. Michigan Radio’s Political Analyst Jack Lessenberry says the real problem goes far beyond that.

I think there’s a temptation for the sort of people who spend a lot of time listening to public radio to roll their eyes at the people who called themselves the Hutaree militia, and who were rounded up and arrested this week not far from the Ohio border.

To the comfortable and well-educated, the Hutaree must seem like something out of a bad hillbilly movie. Indeed, they operated out of a double-wide trailer near a town called Clayton.

They ran around in camouflage clothing, with a cross labeled “Colonial Christian Republic.” They were all white, undereducated and underemployed. They spouted Bible verses while posting videos on YouTube of themselves playing soldier in the woods.

But it wasn’t just play. Federal and state authorities say they were planning to kill a policeman and then blow up more policemen with a series of homemade bombs along the funeral route.

Then they intended to turn that into a widespread uprising against the U.S. government. Instead, thanks to what looks like admirable detective work, nine of the Hutaree are locked up and facing charges. But that, and they, aren’t the real story here.

The real story is that groups like this are on the rise, and that there are a lot of desperate people who are trying to make sense of a difficult and changing world.

They’ve lost jobs; they are trying to cope with bewildering economic hardship and cultural changes, and lack the background and the education to help them do so.

And they also lack responsible leaders who reach out to make them feel part of America.

Instead, they have the House Minority Leader saying that health care reform was “Armageddon,“ a term designed to press extremist buttons.

Frankly, a lot of these folks are uneasy that we have a black president. They are exposed to a torrent of propaganda claiming Barack Obama is a socialist who was born in Kenya and is most likely a secret Muslim. Some of us know how to sort out most of this nonsense. But a lot of people don’t. They turn to churches for consolation, and many of them preach that sooner or later, there will be a cataclysm that brings the world to an end, after a historic and violent struggle between good and evil.

Some so-called mainstream Christian churches in places like Ann Arbor treat these prophecies as myth and metaphor. But others don’t. The Hutaree evidently thought they could prime the pump a little bit, and be a catalyst for the great conflict that would usher in the reign of Christ on earth and end our worries about globalization.

They were caught before they could kill anybody. But their Facebook page alone indicates they were in touch with a lot of similar groups, some of which may be much smarter.

The national expert on this phenomenon is Morris Dees, the guiding spirit of the Southern Poverty Law Center. He says the number of anti-government extremist groups tripled in the year after President Obama was elected. He happens to be speaking tomorrow night at Fountain Street Church in Grand Rapids, and I recommend listening to him if you can. It’s very easy in America to tune out groups whose language and culture are not like ours.

March 30, 2010

State Senators changed their minds last week and passed a law making text messaging while driving a primary offense. Michigan Radio’s Political Analyst Jack Lessenberry takes a look at what went on behind the scenes.

There’s been a lot of grumbling among the common people - that is to say, us - because the legislature took a two-week vacation at the end of last week. The state is still facing a massive budget deficit. The lawmakers haven’t figured out yet how to close this gap, or decided what to do about teacher and state employee pensions.

Actually, they didn’t accomplish much at all, and it isn’t clear why they thought they should take a break. Except, of course, that this is an election year, and most are running for something.

Something fairly dramatic did happen, however, which was almost unnoticed. Last Thursday, the Michigan Senate surprised people by passing a newer and tougher version of a ban on text messaging while driving. Earlier, both houses passed a bill that would make sending a text message while driving a “secondary offense.”

That would mean that the police couldn’t pull you over and give you a ticket if they see you doing it. They could only give you a ticket for text messaging if they pull you over for something considered a primary offense - speeding, say - and see that you were also text messaging. Then they could give you a ticket.

Making text messaging a secondary offense strikes me as being astoundingly stupid. It is almost equivalent to having no law at all. Let’s say the police put on their flashing red lights and indicate they are going to pull you over for something. Aren’t you going to immediately stop text messaging?

Actually, I suspect that some of the lawmakers may not yet understand what a problem this is. If you are a forty or fifty something, the chances are you don’t send a lot of text messages.

You might not send any at all. But today, text messages are how young people communicate. And the message has a potential for tragedy. We barely noticed it here, but three years ago, a pitcher for the St. Louis Cardinals named Josh Hancock died when he ran into a flat-bed tow truck in his Ford Explorer.

Hancock was drunk, but police said the reason he died was that he was text messaging while driving. But St. Louis is far away, and at that point the phenomenon of text messaging was still widely unknown to many grownups.

Then the Kwame Kilpatrick scandal broke, and as a result, we all know a lot more about text-messaging now. State Representative Lee Gonzales of Flint introduced a bill to ban the practice after his pregnant daughter-in-law was rear-ended by a woman punching away on her cell phone. She and the baby were fine.

But they could easily have been killed. Nevertheless, many lawmakers were reluctant to make it a primary offense. “It’s an evolutionary process,“ one said. Not if you get killed on the freeway, it’s not. That’s exactly what happened in Ottawa County two months ago; a teenage driver was killed text messaging his girl friend.

That converted a number of senators. Now, however, the Michigan House has to pass a law making text messaging a primary offense. My advice is that if you should let your state representative know how you feel about this, as soon as possible.

March 29, 2010

You’ve probably heard that Ford Motor Company signed a deal yesterday to sell its Volvo division to a Chinese firm.

This doesn’t come as a surprise. Volvo was a money loser for Ford, and actually was an unpleasant reminder that our domestic automakers have sometimes done their worst when times were best.

Hard to remember now, but a mere eleven years ago we were rolling in dough. The United States government was regularly taking in more money than it was spending for the first time since the 1920s, and Ford was doing exceptionally well too.

You might have thought this would have meant that Ford would have plowed money into improving quality at home.

You might have thought Ford would have invested some of its profits shrewdly, to give the company a cushion against a rainy day.

Nah.

What then-Ford CEO Jacques Nasser did instead was to spend money like a cosmic drunken sailor on steroids. His goal was to assemble a stable of exotic and luxury brands all over the world. So he bought Jaguar and International Harvester and Volvo.

Ford overpaid for them and then spent billions trying to improve and fix them, and then lost billions more.

Eventually they began dumping these brands. Volvo had done better than the others, but still was a giant money-sucking hole in the corporation‘s side. Suffice it to say that Ford spent six and a half billion dollars to buy Volvo, and sold it yesterday for $1.8 billion. I like to think I could have done that without ever going to business school.

To the limited degree I understand automotive economics, selling Volvo seems like a good idea for Ford. The company, the only one of our big three not to go through bankruptcy, is overburdened with debt, and needs to concentrate on its core brands.

The new owner, Zhejiang Geely Holding Group, is led by an enthusiastic 47-year-old named Li Shufu who is widely regarded as the business whiz of China. He is pledging to keep Volvo independent, intact, and said he was committed “to preserve the distinct identity of the Volvo brand.”

Hopefully that will happen. But these events leave thousands of consumers with a dilemma. As true sons and daughters of Detroit who wanted to rally around our core industry in its hour of need, we were able to justify buying Volvos.

We bought them because they were comfortable, reliable and safe, and they were also owned by Ford. We were contributing to hometown profits by buying them, or actually, cutting their losses.

But now we no longer have that excuse. And I have another problem. I like station wagons. And I suspect I am not alone. You need a way to haul stuff around, and my vehicle of choice is a station wagon. I don’t like minivans, recreational vehicles, or any of the truck and bus-like things now sold instead of station wagons.

Volvo makes good station wagons. I have had three. I would buy a Ford Fusion wagon in a heartbeat, but they don’t make them.

Ford does make a spiffy new Focus wagon, but doesn’t plan to sell it in America. So I’d like to pose the same question to the domestic auto industry that Americans usually ask their politicians:

It's hard to remember anything in America like the outpouring of hatred
and bizarrely violent threats directed against congressmen who supported
health care reform.

Not, that is, since the martyrs of the civil rights movement. But this
week, several Michigan representatives, including the firmly anti-abortion
Bart Stupak, received death threats.

Others, including the venerable John Dingell, have been deluged with a
torrent of voice mail, e-mail, and snail mail messages ranging from the
threatening to the merely foul and obscene. This is a national phenomenon,
and two things are most appalling about it: First, the degree to which the
reaction to health care reform is based on misunderstanding and deliberate
lies.

And even worse, the actions of some politicians at winking at violent and
extremist behavior. One problem is that few people seem to have actually
read the bill or even a dispassionate summary of what is in it. Many
evidently believe it means a complete government takeover of health care,
and includes funding for abortion and "death panels" which will decide who
will live and who will die.

In fact, what it does is require most people to buy health insurance from
a private insurer, or pay a fine if they don?t choose to be insured, on the
theory that otherwise, they are likely to become a burden on the public.

What the bill does, really, is provide a lot of new customers to the
private sector, while also forbidding some infamous abuses. Companies can
no longer deny you insurance because of a "pre-existing condition," nor
cancel your insurance if you get sick.

Women can't be charged more than men, and kids can stay on their parents'
policies till they are 26, which will be a great help to college students.

Now, there's nothing wrong with opposing this.

There is nothing wrong with vowing to defeat Democrats at the polls for
supporting it, and promising to try to repeal this law.

There is everything wrong, however, with openly lying about what the law
does, and even worse, at appearing to encourage violent and illegal action
against its supporters.

And that's what is happening. Richard Thompson, the president of the
Thomas More Law Center, is charging that "Americans who oppose abortion
will now be forced to pay for abortion through their tax dollars," which is
clearly false.

State Representative Tom McMillan called the nationally televised
congressional vote "the taking of our freedoms under the cover of
darkness," and has indicated he views this as a socialist takeover of our
economy.

But to those who know their history, the anti-health care vigilante
actions now being reported resemble nothing so much as what Nazi and
Communist street gangs did in Europe in the 1930s.

We know how that turned out.

State Senator Gretchen Whitmer of East Lansing yesterday offered a
resolution to condemn all these violent threats and behavior. "My children
know you don't spit on anybody," she said. Whitmer mentions no party, not
even the Tea Party, and says she wrote it so "people of good will can stand
together and condemn this dangerous trend that threatens real political
discourse in this country." Frankly, that's a pledge we should require
every politician to take before we even think about voting for them.

Civility goes hand in hand with freedom. If we can't preserve both, we're
all in deep trouble.

March 25, 2010

There are a number of efforts underway to allow Michigan residents to opt out of the new federal health care law. Michigan Radio’s Political Analyst Jack Lessenberry wants to know if that is constitutionally possible…

I’ve spent a lifetime covering politics and politicians, so very few things surprise me any more. But I have to say I was stunned when just hours after health care reform passed, people started talking about having Michigan “opt out” of the federal law.

An apparently ad hoc group called Michigan Citizens for Health Care Freedom wants to put something on the November ballot asking voters if they want to opt out of the federal health care plan. Meanwhile, Attorney General Mike Cox said he would join other state officials in challenging the constitutionality of the law Congress passed extending health care benefits.

This left me scratching my head, because all my life I had been taught that all this was impossible. There’s a little thing called the Supremacy Clause in the U.S. Constitution that says, in completely unambiguous language, that “all laws of the United States which shall be made … shall be the supreme law of the land … the laws of any state to the contrary notwithstanding.“

The Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution pretty much repeats that, saying that “no state shall make or enforce any law,“ that will abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States.“ There was also a little something called the Civil War, which was all about whether states could defy the central government.

Six hundred thousand people died to settle this issue, and the answer was that states most certainly cannot. So how can folks be saying they are going to opt out of a federal law?

However, I also am aware of something else: I am not a lawyer, nor a Constitutional scholar. But I know someone who is. I called Robert Sedler, who has the special rank of Distinguished Professor of Constitutional Law at Wayne State University.

Sedler has written widely on constitutional matters and successfully argued cases before the U.S. Supreme Court. What’s going on here? I asked. He laughed. “Political posturing,” he said.

Posturing, or general ignorance. “Any first year law student knows that states cannot defy the federal government. If they pass something, it will be thrown out by the federal courts.”

Now, it didn’t surprise me to learn that Michigan Citizens for Health Care Freedom is based on a wrong-headed idea. It is a Tea Party effort being led by a state legislator with no legal background.

But what about Attorney General Cox’s lawsuit alleging that the Federal Government doesn‘t have the authority to make people buy health insurance or fine them for not doing so?

That’s just as invalid, Sedler told me. “Political grandstanding. He’s running for governor.“ He directed me to a 1923 case, Massachusetts vs. Mellon, in which a then very conservative Supreme Court said it couldn’t just review and cancel acts of Congress on the ground they are unconstitutional.

These efforts are going nowhere, he said. But if you still think Michigan should be allowed to opt out of the federal law, ask yourself these three questions: Should the states that voted for John Kerry in 2004 been allowed to stop sending tax dollars for the Iraq War?

Should Ann Arbor be allowed to opt out of the Michigan constitution’s prohibition against gay marriages?

And finally, whatever happened to the idea of gracefully conceding defeat when you’ve lost, fair and square?

A couple weeks ago, I was over at Macomb Community College, one of our
state’s hidden jewels. Not only does the school do a lot of really
high-end
vocational training, they put on an brilliant series of intellectual and
cultural attractions every year.

Last year, they took an amazing look at the 1960s, and brought people like
President Kennedy’s speechwriter in to participate. Currently, they are
doing a ten-week look at life in the 1930s that is so sophisticated and
full
of top-drawer talent that you would think it was being done by the
Smithsonian.

The series is called "And Still They Prospered: Living Through the Great
Depression." They’ve got a large cultural exhibit that includes
everything
from one of Henry Ford’s suits to a car identical to the one that Bonnie
and Clyde were gunned down in.

The series includes lectures by some of the state and the nation‘s top
historians, including Alan Brinkley, the Pulitzer-Prize winning David
Kennedy
and Tom Sugrue. Other experts and nationally-known authors are looking at
culture, arts, labor, Hollywood, and virtually every other aspect of
Depression life.

I was there to meet Kennedy, and had a conversation with someone who was
trying to get publicity for the event. That’s been a challenge, because
the
school is too-seldom visited even in the Detroit area, because it happens
to be miles from any freeway.

To my surprise, the official said her main goal was to get the series
mentioned on Michigan Radio. "That’s the audience we want. People who
think.
People who are interested in a wide variety of things, and who aren’t
afraid
to learn new things."

Naturally, I was pleased that she understands
what
Michigan Radio is trying to do. But I have to confess I am even more pleased to be associated with a
station where news is more than a drive-by shooting, and culture is
more than a
remake of Bonnie and Clyde.

One of the biggest songs during the Depression years was "Brother, Can You
Spare a Dime?" I hope that to keep Michigan Radio humming through this
century, you can spare a little more.

I have to think that there must be times when even the most dedicated
politician has to wish they were an anonymous shoe salesman in Bay City.
And for Governor Jennifer Granholm, last week may have been one of those
times. First, there was the fiasco over the convicted felon who scammed the
state's economic growth authority into granting him $9 million in
tax credits for an apparently phantom business he promised to bring to
Flint.

Then there was the enormous reaction to the governor proclaiming last
Saturday "Michigan Meatout Day." She encouraged every resident of the state
to give up meat for a day and, quote, "explore a wholesome diet of
vegetables, fresh fruits, and grains."

The moment she signed that proclamation, the meat industry and its
spokesmen descended on her like a mob of avenging angels.

In one of the more moderate comments, the Michigan Farm Bureau called
this an "insensitive slap in the face" to the state's livestock farmers.

The hunters' lobbying group, Michigan United Conservation Clubs, proclaimed
Saturday -- and every other day following -- "Michigan Meat Eaters Day."
Both houses of the legislature, which normally can't agree on the color of
grass, voted to denounce Governor Granholm for this.

And even Jerry Schneble, the man who started this all by asking the
governor to proclaim "meatout day," wasn't satisfied.

He wrote the Detroit Free Press an e-mail to defend himself against the
charge that he was a "food elitist," and then sniffed that he was
disappointed that the governor didn't add a clause to the meatout
proclamation that "touted Michigan's fine produce -- apples, asparagus,
beans, blueberries" et cetera, et cetera.

The governor stood firm and didn't back down. Now, I have often been a
critic of Governor Granholm's, but in this case, I think her critics need
to get a grip. The governor isn't a vegan or even a vegetarian. She didn't
attack carnivores. She merely suggested not eating meat for a day,
presumably because she believed that would be a healthy thing to do.
In fact, there are legions of doctors who for years have been telling
their patients to go easy on the meat, especially red meat.

Governors issue proclamations all the time proclaiming "cherry week" or
"secretaries' day," without much reaction at all except from the group that
is being honored. My guess is the governor thought this would be like that
too. But instead, people went ballistic.

Exactly why is hard to understand. Maybe with the economy the way it is,
everybody freaks out at any perceived threat to their livelihood. Maybe it
is because vegetarianism and veganism seem to be gaining popularity,
especially among the young.

For years, a fellow named Gary Yourofsky has been going around Michigan
proclaiming that it is immoral to "eat anything that ever had a face, a
mother, or a bowel movement." That could make the pork producers a bit jittery.

Still, my guess is that
the meat lobby ended up benefiting from the fuss over "Meatout Day." And I
would be willing to flatly predict that we'll live a long time before we
see another governor do this again.

Now if only we could get people this riled up over threats to their
children's education.

Back in the days when Ronald Reagan was negotiating arms control
agreements with Mikhail Gorbachev, the President had a slogan he liked to
repeat over and over, in bad Russian: Trust, but verify.

That's good advice in any situation. Trouble is, most
of us tend to forget that when we really want to believe. However, I have a friend who is more suspicious. Pat Clawson is a classic
investigative reporter who has worked for CNN, among other places. He's
spoken to classes I teach.

And while Clawson's a suspicious old bird, he lives in and cares about our
poor battered town of Flint. Times aren't good for journalists, and he
makes his living partly as a private investigator. That's sort of similar
to what
investigative reporters do.

Anyway, Clawson did us all a favor last week, even though he embarrassed
the governor in doing so. Clawson likely saved some investors thousands or
millions of dollars, though he isn't holding his breath waiting for thank
yous. Here's what happened.

He was in Lansing Tuesday night, where the Society of Professional
Journalists were holding a reception to raise scholarship money, and, as he
told me, "I was introduced to a young Flint Journal reporter who asked me
what I thought about the big economic development news out of Flint that
day."

What happened was that the Michigan Economic Growth Authority had granted
a $9.1 million tax credit to a firm he had never heard of, called
RASCO, run by a man named Richard Short.

Clawson hadn't heard of it, or him. He asked the reporter what she knew
about the people running the company. He told me "She said she didn't know
anything about them, but was very enthused about all the new jobs the
company would bring to Flint." RASCO, by the way, was promising to hire
boatloads of people to sell renewable energy products to people in rural
Africa and the developing world.

Clawson suggested she curb her enthusiasm until she knew more about the
company and the people behind it. That would have been even better advice
for state officials, including the governor, who that very day had highly
praised Richard Short in public.

"When I got home that night I went on the Internet and read her story,
then I accessed the company's web site," he said.
The address was a mobile home park. He then ran some quick public records
checks on Mr. Short.

Turns out he is a convicted felon. He served six years in prison for
embezzling money from a battery maker in Muskegon, and for bank loan fraud.
And he was being sought for not paying restitution for his past crimes.

Today, Short is back in jail.

The embarrassed state development authority now says it will start doing
background checks. About time, you might think.

"All it took for me to find this out was 15 minutes," Clawson said.
"I just used basic access to the same public records that every citizen has
the right to inspect."

My guess is that the phony company would have used the tax break to
attract investors, who probably would never have seen their money again. I
suggested to Clawson that he deserved an award. "Keep it," he said, "I
have a wall full of them."

March 19, 2010

Governor Granholm has said that if the legislature is unwilling
to vote on her proposal to extend the sales tax to services, there should
be a statewide vote of the people on it. Michigan Radio's Jack Lessenberry
thinks she is leaving something out.

The other day, Governor Jennifer Granholm said that if the legislators
don't have the guts to vote on her proposal to lower the sales tax slightly
and extend it to services, they should put it on the ballot and let the
voters decide whether to do so.

Well, I understand her frustration. But the governor is missing a major
step here. Part of the problem is that she suffers from what you might call
Lansing Insider Disease.

The problem is that she spends her time talking to people, both friends
and enemies, who understand the fine points of state finances and
government policy. The average voter doesn't have a clue. They know they
don't want more taxes, and don't have enough money.

They also know they want their kids to have a quality education. But they
don't know how all the moving parts work together, and they haven't taken
the time to figure out how various policy choices trade off against each
other.

That is not, repeat not, because the average voter is stupid. It is
because people are busy trying to make a living, if they are lucky enough
to still have a job, and they are busy trying to find one if they don't.
They are running after their kids and worrying about their parents and
trying to get the old car to make it another year.

The Founding Fathers knew that, even if they didn't foresee soccer moms
and minivans, and that's why we have representative government. We elect
officials to study issues, pay attention to our needs and wishes, and make
policy decisions for all of us.

But the framers of our state constitution also provided for a statewide
vote of the people on certain laws and amendments.

Yet before the governor even thinks about that, here is what I think she
should do. Ask for -- or buy -- half an hour of television time, and
explain the situation to the voters of Michigan.

She needs to do the modern equivalent of one of Franklin D. Roosevelt's
famous fireside chats. There was no TV during the Great Depression, but
when FDR had an important decision to sell to the people, he would go on
the radio to explain it to America. He did one when he temporarily closed
the nation's banks, and Will Rogers said afterward that he took such a
dry subject as banking and explained it so everyone could understand it --
even the bankers.

Jennifer Granholm is said to be one of the best communicators in politics,
and she indeed can be. But all too often, she hasn't tried. She has asked
for tax increases without explaining to us what she wants to do and why.
That's not to say that her sales tax plan is necessarily right, or that
even if she does explain it, that people will go for it.

But I can tell you this. I talked to people this week in a diner in
Elmira, near Gaylord, and at the other end of the state in Warren. If her
tax proposal were to come up for a vote now, they'd vote no. The governor
has the ability to get our attention for another nine months, and then
she's gone.

March 18, 2010

From time to time, I run into people who actually agree with some of these
essays, which is a gratifying experience. Sometimes, I used to read them
to my dog before I broadcast them, and he virtually never disagreed.
Unfortunately, he died in January. So it's nice to get some positive
feedback. Every so often, however, somebody says something completely bizarre,
like, "Your ideas are great! So...why don't you run for office?"

The first time it happened, all I could think of was Groucho Marx's famous
quip that he would never join any club that would have him as a member.
Actually, I strongly believe that journalists should never cross that line. Our role is to be independent analysts, even those of us who offer informed
opinions and suggestions on policy.

We aren't supposed to be politicians. I don't think we can easily switch
roles without confusing ourselves about who we are, let alone the public.

Actually, apart from that, I couldn't run for anything because I cannot
imagine asking anyone for campaign contributions.
Which is what professional politicians do all the time. They do
entertaining things too, which makes covering them fun.

Several times, I've gone off to interview statewide candidates who were
brought somewhere to meet me and had no idea where they were. Last summer, I
was asked if I wanted to interview one of the Republican candidates for
governor.

His handlers suggested I meet him at a funky café in a gay-friendly
suburb. They dropped him off, and we had an interesting interview. Eventually, I
asked him why he had wanted to meet me there. He asked what I meant. Look
around, I said.

The café, known for raucous marathon singing contests, was decorated in
early Salvation Army style. Most of the patrons were young, pierced and
tattooed. We were two graying guys in gray suits. Everyone else probably thought
we were narcotics agents.

"We don't really fit in here, don't you think?" I asked.

He said, "I don't know where I am."

They'd brought him there and later came to take him away. Later, I
concluded that since I write a column for an alternative newspaper, someone
thought I'd be at home in an alternative place.

Even more amusing was the time I met Philip Ruppe in Monroe, when he was
running for the U.S. Senate. He didn't know where he was, either. That wasn't surprising; he'd been a congressman from the Upper Peninsula. When his
driver didn't show up, he asked if I'd take him to his next stop.

I didn't mind, except he didn't know where he was supposed to go next
either, which made getting him there a little problematic. I forget how that
all turned out, except that he ended up losing by half a million votes. His
wife, however, was appointed to run the Peace Corps, so he ended up back in
Washington anyway.

But while it's easy to be critical, I do admire anyone who is willing to
dedicate themselves to public service.

And having thought about it, I guess I'd be willing someday to fill an
unexpired term on the Huntington Woods library board, if anyone ever offers to
appoint me. The city is only two square miles in size, and I might manage
to avoid getting lost.